Tag Archives: Trailer

“It’s like poetry … they rhyme. Every stanza kind of rhymes with the last one. Hopefully it’ll work.” – George Lucas

When Disney unveiled the third and last trailer for The Force Awakens earlier this week, it was nothing less than a great disturbance in the Force. It’s already been viewed more than 29 million times on YouTube and spawned endless speculation ahead of the movie’s December 18th release date.

The trailer was everything we could have hoped for. It had it all – Han, Chewie, Leia, Rebels, Stormtroopers, X-Wings, TIE Fighters, Jedi, Sith and more. It also left plenty to the imagination, with the plot of the film being largely unknown. Overall, it spoke to the kid in all of us that will always love Star Wars.

But take off the nostalgia goggles for a minute and you might notice a few worrying hints about the Star Wars sequel. If the prequel trilogy taught us anything, it’s to temper our expectations a little.

Remember, the trailer for The Phantom Menace was great, too. What might be cause for concern is just how similar this new film seems to the original trilogy, particularly A New Hope. Familiarity is great, but The Force Awakens needs to forge its own path, creating its own unique moments and characters. Unfortunately, there are some signs this isn’t the case.

Disclaimer: I’m a huge Star Wars fan. I’ll probably be fighting off tears several times during The Force Awakens. Hell, I even liked the prequels as a kid (I’ve since seen the error of my ways). And I think J.J. Abrams was the perfect choice to direct the next Star Wars film. There are just a few things about the new trailer that are giving me a “been there, done that” vibe.

The Setting

An opening space battle: This is a bit of an assumption, but based on what we’ve seen I think it’s a safe one. We know that Finn starts the film as a Stormtrooper, and it seems he crash lands at the outset of the film. What would have caused his crash? A space battle between Rebels and Imperials, of course. This by itself isn’t that big of a deal, since other episodes have started with space battles, but when you add in the next fact…

Main character(s) crash landing on a desert planet: Yes, technically the desert planet is named Jakku. But the name is just about the only difference between it and Tatooine. Don’t get me wrong – the imagery of the crashed Star Destroyer is fantastic. But why couldn’t it have crashed on a nice temperate planet instead? Oh, because then there wouldn’t be so many great parallels with…